Book review: Room for Rent by Noelle W Ihli

Room for Rent by Noelle W Ihli features a really likeable lead character. I warmed to Nya immediately. We quickly learn she’s defied her religious family and upbringing to leave home and study nursing at college. She’d been living with her bestie who graduated earlier so Nya has to find affordable accommodation to get through her last semester before starting her real life – and be reunited with her bestie again. When she finally finds a share-house within her budget she assumes her room-mate / landlord Sidney is female, but when she arrives she discovers it’s a really creepy guy.

About this book

Nya can’t remember the last time she felt safe.

The rundown rental house didn’t seem so bad at first. But now someone is stealing her food. Rattling her bedroom doorknob. Digging through her belongings.

Each night brings more disturbing incidents. And, each night, Nya is more convinced that it’s not an intruder. She suspects the culprit is hiding in plain her peculiar roommate-of-necessity, Sidney.

Nya can’t afford to live anywhere else. The horrible rental is her only option. In a few months, she’ll finish her final semester of college and get the hell out of dodge. But, to her horror, the sinister mind games are just the beginning. Before long, she’s forced to face the possibility that her physical safety may be at risk. Maybe even her life.

My thoughts

Nya decides she WON’T live in her car and develops a vague stand-off with Sidney, spending as little time as she can at home. She’s uneasy though… there are sounds from the basement which is off-limits and she senses someone has been in her room in her absence, and also at night when she’s been sleeping.

Happily for Nya she comes across fellow-student Curtis and ponders romance for the first time. Curtis though has heard of her house (the Gore Shack) and tells her Sid’s previous room mate was beaten and left for dead. Thankfully for Nya the time spent with Curtis becomes somewhat of a haven, only matched by her frequent contact (calls and texts to bestie Jade… who incidentally feels like a character we get to know well, even if it is just through Nya).

Something I appreciated about Nya, or Ihli’s portrayal of her is that – though she’s charmed by Curtis’s affection and generosity – she realises he doesn’t ‘give her butterflies’ the way she thought her first boyfriend might. It’s an unsettling for her and liked that we got to dive deep enough into Nya’s mind and feelings to be aware of that.

Ihli does a good job with the pacing and rising tension here. I did guess where this was going–not all of it of course, but most. But I enjoyed it nonetheless.

Room for Rent by Noelle W Ihli was published by Macmillan and is now available.

I received a copy of this book from the publisher for review purposes.